Готовый перевод Сломанные крылья Серебра / The Broken Wings of Silver: 2

Shikuno, Ristol City -- Tessa Sublunar, Silver 4th rank.
* * *

The mistress of the city stretched out with pleasure on the luxurious bed covered with silk sheets. It was so pleasant, so delightful, to feel young. Her graceful legs touched the floor with cat-like grace, and the cold of the parquet pleasantly cooled her bare feet. The open window and the dank wind of the last month of winter, walking around the bedroom, did not bother her. That one, like her, could not get sick with a common cold.

Getting out of bed, in two sliding steps, she found herself in front of a full-length mirror. She looked herself over from head to toe. A ripple ran across her thin, but nevertheless incredibly feminine lips, turning into a smile. One of those smiles for which men are ready to start wars or storm the highest mountains.

If someone had been able to look into the window of the third floor of one of the elite houses on the central street of the city of Ristol, into the bedroom of the apartment registered in the name of Tessa Orima, they would never have forgotten what they saw.

The dance in which the young sixteen-year-old girl was spinning was not just beautiful, it was so beautiful that there is no talent in this world could describe it. And whoever tried to take on this hopeless task would only end up with an absurd shadow, not conveying even a hundredth of a percent of that grace, plasticity, and perfection of movements in which literally fluttered, barely touching the floor, the one whose name is Sublunar.

But no one is destined to see it, not today, not tomorrow, not ever! Silver does not dance for people, it does not dance for anyone but itself. Such is the nature of Silver. Its strength. Its power.

They say that once upon a time, many thousands of years ago, this was not so. But these are fairy tales, myths, and legends, in which there is not a grain of truth.

Having finished the dance, Tessa seemed to float to the closet and put on the first dress she found. The translucent sundress, stitched with silver threads, gave her already perfect figure a certain weightless finishing touch. Turning the fragile, young girl into an unattainable ideal of beauty.

"How good it is to be young again!" A barely audible whisper escaped the lips of the Mistress.

For the ones like her, there is no need for a corporeal shell. But it is so nice to feel herself not only a spirit, but also truly alive. It's so attractive that all the strength, all the energy that is required to create a body, all this pays off in her eyes a hundredfold. She regretted only one thing, that her rank in the Forces does not allow her to create new bodies more often than once every thirty years. If she had her way, she would forever remain young. As young as now, to feel how living, hot, young blood disperses the cold of the Silver Ice of her soul.

One bad thing is that after rebirth, there is always a loss of strength. Not physical strength, but other strength. But this was fixable. During the three months that she was busy. Pulling the smallest particles to her Spark and forming a living body from them, during this time, Tribute had already accumulated. Tribute she can collect and thereby restore her reserve and feed the Spark.

Taking another look in the mirror, Tessa sighed regretfully and took off her dress. Such a natural gesture and reaction, as if she really were an ordinary woman. With a little sadness in her eyes, she held it in her hands and, with a sharp movement, threw it back into the closet. Picking up the clothes scattered on the floor, she pulled on her jeans, hiding the grace of her legs, and wrapped herself in a thick wool sweater, almost to the knees, behind which even the sharpest eye could not see her perfect body. Old sneakers that had seen better years, an absurd, such a childish-looking hat with two lush pom-poms, as well as huge glasses of an ugly, repulsive shape, completed her wardrobe. Leaving the bedroom, she did not even look in the mirror; there was nothing to look at there, what interest in looking at a completely ordinary girl with the appearance of a gray mouse-nerd.

Before leaving the apartment, the one whose name Tessa looked into the nightstand and took out a new set of documents that no policeman could find fault with. Of course, they were real, not a cheap fake. Before dispersing her old body, she reliably took care that no one would have any questions about her new incarnation in the world of the living. The documents went into her purse, as did the keys. Glancing briefly at her makeup, she brushed it onto the floor in irritation. She would not need it for the next ten years, and this thought spread through her body like a pleasant warmth.

Having closed the door behind her, she looked around. The landing looked empty. In the human world, it was empty. But she saw two worlds at once, and in the second one, which people do not believe in, a shadow dressed in a black robe froze two steps away from her. Frozen, leaning on the two-handed sword of Darkness. Noticing her gaze, the Black of the Fifth rank bowed respectfully and hissed-whispered.

"My Mistress."

She glanced at him indifferently, not even deigning to nod, and ran down the stairs like an ordinary human girl rushing about her business. She was tormented by hunger, a hunger incomprehensible to a human or any living person, and she was really in a hurry...

* * *
Shikuno, Ristol City - Dan Lier, the human being.

This time, it was not painful to die. Last time it was excruciating, but now it was even pleasant, as I fell into a deep, long-awaited sleep. As if I were being sucked into quicksand, so slowly death did not hurry to take me. The soul clung to the body with the last of its strength, not wanting to leave it. It clung and weakened with every second, but resisted for three hours, from sunset until almost midnight.

But it ends. I don’t feel my body anymore. My soul, it is no longer connected to it. And I feel light, so light that I fly above the sofa.

It's strange. I can move. I can. I have no body, I'm hanging in the air, but I can move my hand. I open my eyes, and fear runs through me.

I am incorporeal.

I am a spirit.

My spirit is not formless, it follows the contours of the physical body. Somehow I know this will not last long, a few minutes and an unearthly wind will blow me away without a trace and I will die, finally. This thought brings peace. If I could laugh, I would. How wrong the philosophers of my native world are:

//"I think, therefore I exist!"

How absurd, this phrase seems to me now. You philosophers were all wrong! I think, but I am already dead.

It's getting harder and harder to float above the bed, as if the planet's gravity is crushing me, although how can gravity affect the soul? Another absurdity.

And why am I thinking about such nonsense in the last seconds of my life?

I stand on the floor, trying not to look at the abandoned body. I stand on the floor! The spirit stands on the floor and feels the surface! What nonsense! But that's how it was. I still have legs, even though they are woven from something like multi-colored mist, nevertheless, I can stand on them.

Last time he died differently. Not like that. Everything was fast, almost instantaneous, and I don't remember at all how the spirit left the broken body, lying like a dead heap at the bus stop. A slight curiosity makes me overcome my rejection and look at the soulless body lying on the sofa.

Very young, he turned sixteen only three months ago. Good, much better than my first: tall, athletic, perfectly healthy. A face with regular, if a little sharp, but symmetrical features, hair black as a raven's wing. Strong palms for such an age, with surprisingly thin and long, aristocratic fingers. If I looked like this in a past life, there would be no end to the admirers, and modeling agencies would stand in line in front of my apartment, begging me to shoot for them. A body strong enough to resist someone else's soul and reject it. And even though I got it by chance and undeservedly, I am offended, very offended.

Ah, the real Dan Lier, the boy who couldn't come to terms with the death of his parents and chose death instead of life without them. What a fool you are! You were... And your body is bad, why didn't it accept me? What difference does it make to him? Its native soul left it anyway, not wanting to live, so why did it reject me? I remember how good, free, and easy I felt the first few days, before the weakness came. I've never felt so good, even when I was sixteen! And now...

It's a shame.

But.

What that?!

As soon as I focused my gaze, I saw that my entire body was covered in some kind of slime. Translucent, grey, disgusting, I wanted to look away from it and run. It gave off a sense of menace and nausea. And I realized that it was not my body that was rejecting me, but this slime that was sucking the life out of me, breaking the connection between the earthly and the spiritual. It wasn't even breaking it, but rather eating it, thereby killing me.

This shit is killing me! I am dying not because some laws of the universe forbid my soul to occupy this shell. No! This slime, invisible in the created world, is drying me up. It is killing me!!!

No!!

No way!!!

I reach out with my hands woven from weightless mist to the slime and begin to tear it into pieces. At first, it does not give in. But, here is my fear, turning into anger. Anger into fury, and my hands fill with a strange, dark-crimson light, and under them, the slime begins to give in. To give in reluctantly, not wanting to come off the body. Having torn off the first piece, I find out that the slime is a part of something greater. Some terrible spirit wrapped me in a cocoon of it and pulled life itself, absorbing it. Second by second, minute by minute, almost all two months that I spent in this world, all this time I was being devoured!!! And I need to destroy the cocoon, remove the slime, and run! Run before its owner finds me!

However, it is not easy to cope with it. I tear off a piece, it immediately tries to suck on my spirit, I have to throw a lump of mucus on the floor, but even there, it does not disappear, but begins to crawl back. I try, but I do not have time; the cocoon is restored faster than I destroy it. And also, the spirit that spat me with this gray, sticky mass, he feels my attempts to free myself. He feels, and he does not like it. And that means he will come soon! This thought makes me tear the mucus even more furiously, and still, I do not have time.

The desire to live gives strength, even when it seems that this strength is completely gone.

Get off, you abomination!

This is my body!

This is my soul!

But no, the slime is stronger. It is not intelligent, it is like an element, it just wants to milk all the juices out of me, all the energy, and the fact that I will die, its owner does not care at all about such a trifle.

When there is less than a minute left before the end of my existence, I hear a distant cry, full of rage, anger, and some kind of extreme despair.

"Mine! Go away! Mine!! I won't give it u-u-u-u-up!!"

They are shouting far away and not at me. And it can only be called a shout conditionally, because the ears do not hear it; it is a spiritual cry.

I continue to fight, although I don't see the point, just with some kind of extreme stubbornness, although the outcome of this fight has long been clear to me. And suddenly, something changes. The mucus begins to give in!!! The torn-off pieces no longer climb, wanting to reunite into a cocoon; they simply fall to the floor, fall, and melt. The mucus tries to fight, becoming thinner, but not wanting to release my body from its grip, but something has changed, and now I am stronger!

"No-o-o-o-o-o! M-i-i-i-i-i-n-e-e-e-!!!"

The new scream is full of pain and a sense of some incredible loss. It is so powerful that if someone screamed like that on the street, in the physical world, all the glass in my apartment would break.

As soon as this scream dies down, the slime gives in! It loses its plasticity and viscousness, hardens and crumbles under the crimson light of my ghostly hands. And when the last piece of it falls to the floor, I am sucked into the body lying on the couch as if into a funnel.

And I understand - I will not die today!

As soon as this thought is formed, consciousness leaves me and I fall into a dark oblivion...

* * *
Shikuno, Ristol City -- Tessa Sublunar, Silver 4th Rank.
* * *

It's a pity this city is so small, with only three hundred thousand people alive. It can barely support her existence. The city is of no use to any of the Highest of high rank, a trifle that is unworthy of their attention. Three hundred years ago, she came here and took it for herself. How long ago it was, and it seems like yesterday.

Having taken the three-month Tribute from the Reds and Blacks, having killed a couple of Grays who had carelessly crossed her path, Sublunar almost half restored her Spark, which had been drained by the creation of a new, young body.

She saved the best for last. Izuro High School, which was looked after by the only Silver in the city besides her, Elir Horn, Rank six, her loyal vassal.

She liked to walk like this at night, especially like today, under the full moon. The light of her soul and the light of the Moon intertwined in a silent dance of spiritual lines; she wanted to sing, but she restrained herself. Silver sings only for itself. This is its strength. This is its power. And here they can see her, and it would be wrong.

As she approached the school grounds, she lit a spiritual flame in her palm.

But no one came out to answer her call.

It was unusual.

This has never happened before!

Night and the gates to the school grounds are closed.

She stood in front of the chain with the massive lock and looked at it stupidly. Never before had anyone in her city dared not to immediately respond to her call! She had not found herself in such an absurd situation for so long that she had even forgotten what surprises looked and smelled like.

In frustration, she took a deep breath and stepped out of her body, completely immersed in the spiritual world. The body remained standing, and she herself, her essence, her spirit, stepped through the bars without any problems.

"Elir..." She called quietly.

And in response, silence, again, no one answered. And only a strange shadow moved around the corner of one of the school buildings. Too big a shadow.

Stepping forward, she barely managed to pull her foot back to avoid stepping on the grey, nasty slime. It was worth taking a closer look, as it became clear that almost the entire school yard was covered with this nastiness.

What? She hasn't been out in the city for three months. Where did this come from? Where are her vassal and the cleanup teams looking? Although she herself forbade Blacks from going beyond the school fence and it's not their fault.

"Elir." But, there is no answer again.

It's okay. She will find her vassal who forgot his duties. She will find him, and he will beg her for mercy. Where did he hide, and where did so much of this slime come from?

"Elir..." Her call became demanding.

And it was answered.

A massive grey body like a caterpillar with a crocodile's head crawled out from behind the school. Nasty oozing slime, huge as a double-decker bus. Silver looked tiny against it.

"Elir..." The owner of the slime boomed. "Elir is delicious..." The creature's huge mouth opened and it licked its lips carnivorously. "Was..."

Tessa recoiled. No, not from fear, but from surprise. She had only heard in ancient legends of such large Grays and even Devourers. But she had never seen such giants before. Her unearthly beautiful face was distorted by a grimace of disgust.

Devourers. The most stupid and stupid of spirits. Those who do not know how to stop. They pour their slime on people and squeeze everything out of them. Stupid, stupid, that's how to waste such a valuable resource. But they do not know how to say "stop" to themselves and their hunger is more important than any other feelings. Gray, such is the nature of any of them.

Sublunar wasn't afraid. He might be huge. He might exude some kind of primordial, fervent Power, but he was inferior and incapable of harming her - Silver. She was only concerned about one thing: where did he get such a Power? Oh, no! He wouldn't die so easily, the creature would tell her everything at first!

The Silver Maiden's palms clenched habitually.

A short flash and the Scourge of Punishment, guided by her hand, strikes the vile carcass of the Gray, causing him to writhe in unbearable pain.

Feeling her power, the stupid giant tried to run. But who in both worlds can run from Silver?

"Where?" The scourge strikes again. "You." The blows rain down one after another, leaving wide gaps in the Devourer's spiritual flesh. "Got." A particularly successful swing and the grey abomination loses its tail. "Power!"

She had hardly said this when the creature stopped. Then it calmly endured two blows from the Scourge and focused its cloudy, small, beady eyes on her. There was so much rage, so much pain, so much desire in that gaze that Tessa involuntarily recoiled. The Highest recoiled from the Lowest. Absurd! Shame! But only this saved the Silver maiden.

"Mine! Go away! Mine!! I won't give it u-u-u-u-p!!!" The Devourer screamed.

He screamed so loudly that every spirit in the city heard him. And when they heard, they hurried to hide in the deepest hole and tremble there with fear.

Each of his words was filled with Power. And this power beat and whipped the girl like a feather in a hurricane wind. If she had not flinched, if she had remained in the focus of the scream, she would have been flattened as if by a hammer. If this stupid giant had been able to do a little more than splash out naked power, nothing would have saved her. But his mind was meager, like any of the Grays.

At that very moment, Tessa realized that this nothingness had actually managed to absorb Elir. How much power he had! And how she wanted to know where he got it from! But the dead don't need power. Between greed and life, she made the right choice. The Scourge of Punishment was replaced by the Lunar Sword.

Having recovered from the initial shock, the maiden was ready to fight. However, in order to cope with such a giant, she would have to give it her all.

The creature's new powerful blow fell into the void; the maiden was no longer there.

A swing and the blade of the sword cut off one of the Devourer's paws. The creature strikes again, but Tessa is already standing on the other side, and the Lunar Blade knows no mercy.

//So much Power, so much Might!" - Sublunar envied the Inferior without any shame. She envied it like a dervish who spent his whole life in the asceticism of the desert, looks at someone who splashes in a lake and does not know his happiness.

The Grey giant tried to resist. His blows were all-crushing, and if he hit even once, the Spark of the maiden, already exhausted by the rebirth, would surely go out. But, no one in both worlds can compare with Silver. There is nothing faster than they, for Silver is Thought itself.

Feeling his impending death, the Devourer screamed again.

"No-o-o-o! Mi-i-i-i-i-n-e-e-e-e!!" And those city spirits who had not yet hidden from his first cry, hastened to immediately correct this oversight.

And the maiden realized that the lower spirit is not afraid of dying the final death, but of losing something! It is afraid of this loss more than its death!

"Speak." Without delivering the final blow, Tessa froze, with her blade raised.

"No-o-o-o." This time the Devourer didn't scream, but whispered, and there was nothing left of him, a small lump of slime, the size of a fat pig. "Mine... Only mine..."

He won't tell, he'll die, but he won't tell. The maiden understood this with all clarity.

"Moron..." The silver stroke of the blade, shimmering in the moonlight, puts the final point in this strange conversation.

Watching the filth die slowly and painfully, the maiden realized she had crossed the line in this fight. Her Spark was barely flickering and was undoubtedly going out. She had scooped up too much from it, drained it to the bottom. Having waited for the creature's final death, she hurried to the body left in front of the school fence. With each step, her spirit became paler and paler. If only she weren't too late!

She made it, a second before she melted away without a trace, her spirit touched the body and was absorbed into it.

A physical container is not only pleasant, but it is also the last fortress. And even if she is now deprived of strength and has almost no energy left, and what she has is not enough even for one swing of the Scourge, so be it. She is alive, that is the main thing, and that means she will return everything. And if she finds the Source that SO fattened an ordinary slug, the lowest of the low, then the worlds will tremble, both the material and the spiritual worlds.

The young girl, wrapped in an absurd sweater, shivered and, leaning on the school fence, wandered along the alley towards the city center...
* * *

* * *
Shikuno, Ristol City - Dan Lier, the human being
* * *

"Dz-z-z-z-z!!!" The doorbell rang urgently, for the third time in a minute.

Who the hell did they bring? Although it's better to be careful with "devils" in this world, even in your thoughts. The memories of the slime made me shudder. Even though everything that happened at night seemed like a nightmare, I was convinced that everything that happened was not a dream at all. And the main proof of this was my well-being. The weakness that had haunted me for the last few days was gone. And only my stomach was rumbling with hunger.

"D-z-z-z-z!!!" This is an annoying call.

"I'm coming!" I don't want to get up. On the contrary, the desire to close my eyes and fall asleep is almost irresistible, but it's better to open them.

I found my slippers by touch. I put them on and, shuffling along the linoleum, trudged to the front door, looking longingly at the refrigerator, which beckoned and promised to feed. Of course, refrigerators don’t feed anyone here, but there seemed to be food inside. It could be taken out and cooked on an electric stove.

I stopped in front of the door, realizing that I was standing there in just my shorts and flip-flops.

"D-z-z-z-z!!!" Who's so persistent?

"Wait a minute!" I shouted towards the door and began to rummage through the clothes scattered on the floor.

All the things were dirty. The last few days, I didn’t have the strength to go down to the basement of the apartment building where I lived and wash them in the washing machines installed there.

Finally, in this mess, I found a robe, put it on, and shoved everything else in one big pile into the closet, propping up the door with a chair so nothing would fall out.

"D-z-z-z-z!!!"

Having restrained myself from cursing, I tied the sash of my robe and opened the front door. On the threshold with his hand raised to the doorbell, stood a middle-aged, stately man dressed in a strict but expensive, dark blue suit. Carefully polished shoes and a Marco watch on his left hand, with the suit, all spoke of a decent income. I had seen him somewhere before, and the travel bag in his hand was familiar to me.

"Good morning," the visitor said with a slight bow.

"You..." The memories of the last day are like being in a fog, but the suitcase... Exactly! "Doctor?"

"Uh-huh." The visitor clicked his tongue, tilted his head, and looked at me with a searching expression. "Glen Coin, your attending physician."

"Yeah, yeah. I remember." And it's true. He seemed to come when I was lying flat on the sofa. About three days ago, he measured my blood pressure, counted my pulse. It was definitely him.

"Are we going to stand on the threshold like this?" What a sly smile he has, and only one corner of his lips has barely dropped.

"Excuse me." I step aside and let the visitor in. "Please come in. Don't take off your shoes, I was going to wash the floors anyway. Later..."

The doctor walked in as if he were at home. He looked around like he owned the place, went to the kitchen table, winced, and looked doubtfully at his bag. There was reason to doubt. The day before yesterday, I tried to eat, but my hands wouldn't obey and spilled soup all over the table, and to be honest, the floor got it too, and now all that mass that had once been soup had hardened and didn't smell very appetizing. And its appearance wasn't much more pleasant than the slime that had almost killed me.

"Put it right on the sofa, don't be shy," I suggested, waving my hand wearily.

Well, there you go! He still doubts! Should he put his suitcase on my bed or disdain it? And most importantly, he doesn't even try to hide his attitude towards the mess he sees in my apartment. //"Hey! I was actually dying here, I didn't have time to clean up, you know, Mister Doctor!" But, of course, I kept quiet, not saying this tirade out loud.

"Sit down." The doctor finally decided and placed the bag right on the blanket. He invitingly patted the mattress, very proprietaryly inviting me to sit down on my own bed. For some reason, he is starting to irritate me with his arrogance and disgust.

"As you say." Pushing his irritation into the depths of his consciousness, he obediently fulfilled his request.

"So-o-o-o!" Stretching out this word like some kind of mantra, the doctor opened the suitcase and took out a notebook and a pencil. "Your name?"

"Dan Lier."

"Where do you live?" What is the point of this question? Doesn't he know my address?

"Ristol, Seventh Street, Building Eight, Apartment Twelve."

"O-o-o-okay." The doctor wrote something down in his notebook, drawing out his words again. "Where were you born?"

"In Austroi, in the city of Tranbur, the clinic at the Shikuno embassy." It's so good that along with his body, I also got his memory.

"Excellent!" He smiled in such a way that an ordinary sixteen-year-old would have definitely believed in the sincerity of his smile. But I saw in it only tired obligation and habit. "How long have you been in the city?"

"Five weeks."

"How many fingers do I have on my hand?" The doctor suddenly changed the subject and thrust a palm with three spread fingers right under my nose.

"Five!" I said confidently, my good mood quickly returning to me.

"Five?" The doctor looked at his hand uncertainly, and even I could see how he was counting his fingers. One, two, three. "Five? Are you sure, young man?"

"Of course." I can hardly keep from laughing. On my first day in this world, I realized how easy it is to stump the locals. It's not that there are stupid people in this world; that's far from true, but the fact is that quick thinking is not their strong point. "You have five fingers on your hand, doctor, two clenched, three unclenched." It's an old joke that every doctor in my world knows, but for this doctor, it was completely unexpected.

"Ahem..." Apparently, he was hearing such an answer for the first time, judging by his pupils dilating in surprise. "Log-i-i-c." But he was an experienced doctor and quickly pulled himself together. "Well, Mr. Lier, I see that everything is fine with your memory and reason. But when I came to see you last time, you were clearly so plunged into the abyss of despair that you looked like a shadow, not a person." Despite the fact that I understood that the doctor simply gave a comparison that seemed appropriate to him, but still, I was still a little shaken by a bad feeling, 'look like a shadow!' "Lie down, I'll check your pulse and blood pressure."

The doctor's examination lasted about twenty minutes. He not only measured my blood pressure, pulse, and temperature, but also literally felt me ​​all over, from my head to my heels. He even asked me to take off my panties. A hidden pervert or something? Bad, but I know so little about local medicine that I can judge this. But I did move away from the doctor a little, just a couple of centimeters, but I felt better.

"Hmm-m-m." Having checked something with his notebook after the examination, the doctor thought for a moment. "You are healthy. I could enroll you as a pilot right now."

"I'm only sixteen."

"That's true, that's true. And you probably wouldn't dare to be a pilot." It seems like a simple phrase, but for the real Dan Lier, it was a gross provocation. And I answered as he would have answered.

"Mr. Coin." Well, I even remembered his name right away. "The fact that my parents died in an airliner crash does not give you the right to provoke me in such a rude manner!"

"You're angry..." The doctor said with a kind smile, raising his index finger. "And three days ago, you didn't react to this at all. Yesterday you called an ambulance... You're clearly on the mend, young man. And I apologize. I had to ask this, one way or another, that's my job."

"Forgive me for raising my voice." Politeness. Everyone here has a shtick, to be polite, as hard as it is for me, but I have to not stand out. Otherwise, they'll cut me up into parts, trying to figure out how an alien occupied the body of a resident of this world.

"Here." While I was apologizing, he managed to write something down in a notebook and, tearing out a page, handed it to me. "Buy these medicines at the pharmacy." Well, this world is completely different! Completely! The doctor's handwriting was almost calligraphic. This observation, at first meant almost nothing, really got to my gut. "For two days, try to sleep and eat more. And also gather your strength and take a walk in the park, forecasters assure that warming will begin tomorrow." Saying this, the doctor packed his things into a suitcase. "Anyway, rest. I'll come in three days. I'll check on you again."

The doctor rose from the couch, looked at me again, straightened his jacket, and headed for the exit.

"Don't get up, young man, I'll close the door myself. See you soon."

I waved my hand tiredly after him. As soon as the door lock clicked, I got out of bed with difficulty. Fatigue fell on my shoulders like a mountain, but hunger was stronger. Shuffling my slippers on the unwashed floor, I made my way with difficulty to the refrigerator. I found three eggs and the last two sausages in it. I rinsed the frying pan and turned on the electric stove. It took a lot of effort not to fall asleep standing up, but I managed. Having fried an omelet, I ate it straight from the frying pan, not paying attention to the fact that it was unsalted. My stomach demanded more, but the refrigerator was hopelessly empty, and I wanted to sleep even more. Having thrown the frying pan into the sink, I dragged myself with difficulty to the ottoman and fell onto it, without even taking off my slippers. It seems I fell asleep before my head landed on the pillow.

I would have slept, but I was woken up by a terrible rumbling in my stomach. I had to get dressed and crawl out into the street. I woke up late evening, so the nearest store was closed. This city annoys me because as soon as the clock shows eight o'clock in the evening, all the stores close. Although judging by the advertisement thrown into my mailbox, there is a large supermarket here that works around the clock. It is located five kilometers from the city. At least this eight-hour rule does not apply to snack bars and cafes, of which there are a huge number here. It seems the locals have an unwritten law. There must be at least two restaurants on each street.

I went into the first eatery I came across. A small, cozy cafe with four tables, most likely a family business, as evidenced by the many photographs hanging on the walls. The middle-aged woman standing behind the counter looked at me as if she was considering whether to kick this visitor out into the street right there. Actually, she was right in some ways, I looked more like a homeless person than a schoolboy. I should have gone and washed my clothes before going out into the street. But hunger was stronger than such conventions.

"Good evening. Please excuse my appearance, but I just got out of bed after an illness."

Of course, I could have kept quiet, but this is a small town, and rumors probably spread faster than fire. It is better not to attract unhealthy attention to your personality. After my words, the owner of the establishment's gaze noticeably warmed.

"I'd like something very filling and..." He looked down, as if embarrassed, and continued. "And not too expensive, if possible."

It's not that I didn't have enough pocket money, but spending it on delicacies was not in my plans at all. Especially since I'm so hungry that I probably won't even be able to taste the food.

Miss Himano, that was the name of the owner, apparently felt sympathy for me and literally surrounded me with her care and attention. She asked where I lived, when I arrived, where I studied, and also about many other small household details. Then she gave some advice on where things were cheaper. In addition, we agreed with her that a messenger would bring me food directly to the apartment over the next three days. Not for free, of course, not for free, but to my surprise, it was not much more expensive than buying groceries in a store and cooking for myself. Having sincerely thanked the talkative woman, as soon as I finished the last piece, I hurried home.

I spent the next day in groundhog mode, sleeping and eating and nothing more. Twice a day, an eleven-year-old boy, her nephew, as I understood, ran from Miss Himano, brought food, took the money, and quickly ran away. A silent, serious boy, serious beyond his years, and very responsible.

The next day, I felt strong enough to collect my dirty clothes and wash them. It was unusual to go to the basement and toss small coins into the coin-operated washing machines to do the laundry. I wanted to wash the floors, but I didn't have the energy for that. Three hours spent near the washing and drying machines exhausted me like a marathon under the scorching sun. I barely managed to carry all the clothes to the apartment, fold them neatly, and hang them up, after which I fell into a dreamless sleep.

In the morning, the doctor came, waking me up with a demanding call. He asked me how I was feeling, conducted a quick examination, and inquired whether I was taking the prescribed medications. Without a twinge of conscience, I lied that of course I was, although I hadn’t made it to the pharmacy, which I needed to fix by the way. After listening to my answer, he smiled sadly, apparently realizing that I was lying, but he didn’t reproach me and simply promised to come back in a couple of days.

After he left, I took a shower. I would have preferred to lie in the bathtub, but my apartment didn't have one. It was replaced by a shower stall. This apartment is literally imbued with the spirit of minimalism. I lay in bed for an hour and, having gathered my strength, started cleaning. It seems like there's nothing to clean in a studio apartment with a total area of ​​eighteen square meters, but this is only at first glance. In those few weeks that I was "sick", I managed to make it so dirty that cleaning took almost the entire day.

In the evening, I got dressed and went outside. It was drizzling with a nasty, cold rain, and since I didn’t have an umbrella among my things, and a rain hood isn’t the best protection, I preferred to run to the pharmacy.

There was a small line at the drugstore: a couple of old ladies and a young woman. While I was standing and waiting, I noticed a thick reference book on medicines on the drugstore counter. As it turned out, you could freely use it, that is, look through it. I took out the paper on which the doctor had written the prescriptions and looked in the reference book to see what they were going to treat me with. The first prescription turned out to be some kind of tonic and vitamin cocktail, and the second one was appetite-enhancing pills. I definitely don’t need it. I’m already eating like crazy! The third medicine the doctor prescribed was a sedative. When my turn came, I took only the tonic, deciding to refuse the rest. In addition, while I was standing in line, I noticed several disapproving glances at my wrinkled clothes. If I don’t want to stand out, I need to be neater and iron my trousers.

The next day, I put the apartment in full order, ironed the linen and shirts, polished all three pairs of shoes, and took a shower, finally feeling like a human being. The sun had already set, and I lay down on the couch, no longer feeling the same tiredness as before. The constant desire to sleep, sleep, and sleep was not so all-consuming today.

I spent about thirty minutes in a half-sleep, on the border between reality and sleep. And when I was ready to fall into dreams, I suddenly felt a strange sensation. A feeling of unprecedented lightness. I opened my eyes and realized I was hovering half a meter above the bed. No, the body is lying as it should be; it was my spirit that soared, just like that time when I was preparing to die from the mucus. But as soon as I became afraid of what was happening, the spirit was immediately drawn back into its physical container.

The drowsiness disappeared as if by magic.

What was that?

Is my soul really trying to leave my body? Or is it something else? Maybe I have acquired such an ability, something like "astral walking"? I really wanted to believe that the second option was true, because if the first was true, then my affairs were incredibly bad. I would fall asleep someday, and at that time my spirit would fly away somewhere far, far away, and I would simply not wake up. However, the second version was supported by the fact that, being an astral body, I was still fully aware of myself.

Having calmed down, I tried to leave my body again, but to no avail. Again and again, but again no progress. I suffered until the morning, achieving nothing. Maybe this skill can't be activated by a simple act of will? It's a pity that I was never into meditation, perhaps now such a skill would be useful. And so I passed out, once again trying to catch the line between dream and reality.

I woke up with a huge relief. My soul is with me, my body obeys me, so we are alive! I slept for a long time, I didn’t have time to wash up, as the boy from the Himano eatery brought me lunch. Having paid, I thanked him and said he didn’t need to bring me any more food.

After a leisurely snack, I leaned back in my chair and smiled. It was simply wonderful to feel so young. It’s not that I was old when I died. No, I wasn’t even thirty yet, but in that life, I didn’t take care of my health at all, I smoked, liked to drink with friends, and had never done any sports. And only when I felt this young, athletic, and completely healthy body did I understand what a fool I had been back then. The feeling of health and fullness of strength is many times better than any intoxication.

After taking a shower, I decided to try doing push-ups and lost count of seventy. And this is taking into account my body weakened by illness! Phenomenal, phenomenal for the past me, in my old body, I would have died after twelve. I liked it incredibly. So much so that I decided to devote at least an hour to exercise every day. An unthinkable decision for me in the past. More precisely, I often promised myself that from Monday I would start a new life, I would run in the mornings and sign up for a swimming pool, and... Only Monday would come, and nothing in my life had changed. Now, feeling better than ever, I was firm in this intention.

I looked out the window, dressed warmly, and went for a walk. There was no rain, and what the locals consider very cold weather, namely, plus five degrees, is familiar to me. In general, the climate in the country I was in is very mild, snow falls once or twice in winter, no more, and in summer the thermometer rarely breaks the plus thirty mark. But this mildness had a downside. It almost always drizzles here.

Having gone down the stairs, I ran into an old lady at the entrance, I think she lives on the fourth floor. I nodded politely and held the front door open for her, for which I was awarded a benevolent smile. Apparently, I will have to live in this house for at least four years, so it is better to set all the neighbors up positively. The less unhealthy attention I attract to myself, the better. It is much easier if the neighbors consider me an exemplary young man than a bungler, a hooligan, or a drug addict; this will protect me from unnecessary attention.

In the first week of being in this world, having learned a little about it, I was happy and decided to finish school as soon as possible. There was an idea to show myself as a child prodigy and a genius, it shouldn't be difficult, because I was instilled in a schoolboy. But after the "illness" and the slime, my opinion changed radically. This world is not as simple as it seemed to me at the beginning, and it would be much better not to stand out from the crowd. To behave like a completely ordinary person until I figure out what is here and how.

Walking through the park, I once again stirred up Dan's memory, but as before, I found no mention of wandering souls, magic, ghosts, or slime. Except for fairy tales, myths, and legends, which the young man certainly did not believe in. So the question is, either I went crazy during the soul migration, or everything around me is much more complex than it seems.

In general, I was brought to a very strange world. In terms of development, it roughly corresponded to the eighties of the twentieth century on Earth. With many reservations, but...

The world I found myself in was also the third planet in the Solar system. And specifically in the Solar system. There were Mars and Venus, Jupiter and Saturn, Neptune and Mercury were not called that way, of course, but they occupied their places. The Moon was exactly like home, even the Sea of ​​Tranquility was easy to determine. But then...

The geography of this planet was not at all like Earth's. There were no continents. The oceans occupied eighty percent of the surface, and the land was represented by a huge number of islands. If you add up the area of ​​all the islands of this planet, it would barely be enough for Eurasia.

If only the differences were in geography, oh, if only. But there was something that bothered me hundreds of times more. That something was the history of this world. It had nine thousand years of written and continuous history. Which is many times longer than the same period on my Earth. It seems that in such a time, humanity should have long ago conquered space and settled near the nearest stars, or at least populated the Solar System.

But no.

For some reason, progress here moved at a snail's pace. For example, I have a computer at home. As far as I can tell, it roughly corresponds to the 486th model of my world. There is just one nuance: it was bought by my uncle fifteen years ago and is still considered the most powerful home model. And when my uncle bought it, this configuration had already been in production for almost three decades. And so it is in everything. It is not that there was no progress here at all; there was some. If you take a long period of time, then technical development becomes undeniable. But what took years on Earth took decades, or even centuries, here.

I have never been keen on conspiracy theories, but the more I think about the phenomenon of such slow progress, the more clearly the idea forms that the technological development of this world is being forcibly restrained. Aliens, secret sects, societies, or lodges are to blame, of course, I still do not understand, but the feeling of some kind of internal wrongness of this world stubbornly does not leave. And if someone is capable of restraining progress, then undoubtedly he is the true ruler of the world, not presidents, kings, dictators, or prime ministers. They are just a screen. Or maybe I really am sick? I imagine slime, the spirit allegedly leaves the body, and then there seems to be some kind of world government. Paranoia? Br-r-r-r.

On my first day in this world, when I recovered from the initial shock and walked along the deck of a passenger liner, I counted about a dozen inventions that were unknown here, although very simple and familiar to me. Starting with a computer mouse, because here they used trackballs that were inconvenient for the mass user, and ending with such a banality as women's tights. But, after recent events, I probably won't stick my neck out and become a millionaire inventor. I feel that before I have time to invent something, I will immediately find myself in a cemetery, in a cozy coffin under a thick layer of earth.

No, maybe I really am paranoid. But I don't really want to check whether my imagination is running wild or not, because this is not a game and there is no save button here. So I walked around the park, breathing fresh air, following the doctor's orders, until I started to freeze. On the way home, I made a small detour and stopped at Himano's, where I had a hearty snack. I could have gone to any other cafe, but I liked her cooking and decided to refrain from gastronomic experiments for now. In addition, the owner of the cafe was quite talkative, and although she talked mostly about the weather and neighbors, nevertheless, this was not at all unnecessary information for me.

After lunch, I was sitting on a chair and picking my teeth with a toothpick when a frightening thought came to me. Himano had just been distracted by a new client. If this world is about as technologically advanced as the eighties, then doesn't that mean the dental equipment here is much more primitive than I'm used to? This thought made me feel sick. I'm already afraid of dentists, and when I imagine a drill from thirty years ago, I shudder! I mentally thanked the previous owner of the body and his parents for the fact that my teeth are now in perfect condition. I quickly paid and thanked the owner, almost running to the drugstore, where I bought the highest quality toothbrush, the best toothpaste, and mouthwash. If there's one thing I'll definitely take care of, it's my teeth like never before. I really hope that I won't have to meet the local dentists! It's a good thing they haven't invented sugar-free gum here yet, otherwise I would have bought myself a couple of boxes out of fear.

When I got home, I brushed my teeth for about five minutes until I remembered that over-zealousness is also harmful; it seems to damage the enamel, but I didn’t remember exactly.

After taking a shower, I sat down at the computer. It's good that the locals invented GUI. If it had something like DOS, it would have been inconvenient for me, after all, in my past life, I was far from computer technology. I could still reinstall Windows, install drivers, but my knowledge was not enough for more. True, the local system, simply called OS, was inferior in functionality even to Windows 3.1, but at least something. Most of all, I was offended that the Internet is unknown in this world or has not been brought to the masses. Having quickly run through the installed programs, I did not find anything useful, except for a primitive text editor and some kind of mathematical program, to use which it was necessary to study a manual of one and a half thousand pages, and something similar to a drawing program, against which Paint is an unattainable peak of progress. I also found a couple of dozen text files, some financial documents from ten years ago, apparently left over from my uncle, and nothing more. The computer, instead of an endless source of knowledge, turned out to be a dud.

My integration into the local society will be much more difficult than it seemed at first. The fact that the real Dan grew up in a different country, the one in which his parents worked, was both a minus and a plus. The minus was that he knew about life in his homeland only from stories. And the plus was that if I behaved differently from everyone else, it could be attributed to my childhood spent abroad.

I was in dire need of information, but it was difficult to get it. There is no Internet and it won't work as I am used to, to ask Google or Wikipedia on any issue.

In addition, public libraries, by some twist of the law, are only accessible to adults, and that starts at age twenty. The school library is also out of reach, because my transfer to the local school, although fully agreed upon, has not yet been signed. I was just doing this when I finally fell ill with mucus. There was another option, just to buy books, but the price of paper editions here was biting!

Realizing that I couldn't get anything more out of the computer, I went to a newspaper stand and bought the first three new newspapers I came across. At first, I wanted to buy everything, but then I thought that would be overly suspicious.

I studied the newspapers at home. The first one was a financial digest. Quotes, tables, expert opinions. I studied it from cover to cover. At first glance, if you put aside the specifics of the world, I didn’t find anything unusual. The next one was a political herald. The president arrived on a visit... The head of the Solidarity Party participated in a rally... The youth movement planted two hundred trees on the Alley of Memory... And so on. But this “news” confirmed Dan’s memories. The state of Shikuno was a presidential republic with a bicameral parliament. If you put aside the catchy names of the parties, everything was the same as in my world, right, left, centrists, conservatives, and liberals. The usual mess and the fight for the voter. The only difference from my world was that there were no scandals or revelations in the newspaper; everything was outwardly decorous and sedate, like in Victorian Britain. I think, like in that very Britain, there are still those squabbles going on under the carpet, but no one brings them out to the public, especially not to the newspaper pages. And not a word about magic, spirits, or anything similar.

The last newspaper was the local news. The city news. That's what I paid the most attention to. When I put it aside, the general opinion about Ristol was formed - a sleepy kingdom. A completely ordinary provincial town, where nothing interesting happens. What is the fact that the entire second page was dedicated to the school watcher who recently died at his post from a heart attack? An entire page in the newspaper, about a school watcher who was not killed, but died himself! A swamp, not a city, and this pleased me. For my gradual integration into society, you can't think of a better place.

In general, I am extremely lucky with my body. Not only youth and health, but it is also practically the only one in the country. The only relative is my maternal uncle, who has fulfilled the necessary minimum conditions and does not care about his nephew in the slightest.

When the company where Dan's father worked decided to close its office in Austroia, the parents had to move to their homeland. They flew by plane, and decided to send their son by ship so that he could have some fun before the start of the school year. But, there was a plane crash, the parents died, Dan jumped into the sea, not wanting to live, and I took his place. A tragedy, of course, but how lucky I was in such a situation!

According to Dan's parents' will, an uncle was appointed as a guardian, and a monthly board and lodging were allocated for my upkeep, plus tuition for high school. I saw my uncle once, at a funeral; he was some kind of middling businessman and hung around in the capital. So I was sent to this backwater, where he had an old apartment, and it seemed like he had completely forgotten about me. It's good that I filled out the necessary papers, allowing me, despite my young age, to live alone without any supervision from social authorities. Perfect!

Before going to bed, I relaxed in bed, trying again to catch that moment of lightness and get my soul out of my body. And when I lost hope, deciding to spit on and fall asleep, I succeeded! I soared above the ottoman again. This time, I quickly suppressed the initial fright and was not pulled back into the body shell.

Levitating from the bed, I stood on the floor. I looked around. The world had changed. The apartment and all the things remained in place, but they had lost their density, becoming as if drawn. It was the same with my body. I tried to lift the newspaper with my hand, but my palm, woven from multi-colored veins of ephemeral fog, only passed through the paper.

I spent about ten minutes on various experiments. Alas, I had not mastered telekinesis and could not move things, and in general, I could not influence them in any way. But there was an advantage, I could fly, or rather slowly levitate, though not high and not for long. And also pass through doors, walls, and even the ceiling and floor, but I did not try hard with this, afraid of falling through to the neighbors. Who knows, maybe there is a magician living nearby who will dispel me without a trace. The fact that, officially, magic does not exist in this world did not bother me at all now. Here I am, wandering around the apartment in the form of an astral body. What other proof do I need?

I went to the window and looked out onto the street. A rather noisy group of young people, about nine people, about twenty years old, were walking along the well-lit sidewalk. No, they weren't rowdy, they were just loudly discussing the final of some championship. In my state, I heard them as if through a pillow, but I could still make out what they were talking about.

Unlike my soulless body lying on the ottoman, living people looked different in my astral vision. More precisely, their physical embodiment was the same as the one drawn, but in addition to the body, I saw their souls. Or maybe they were not souls, but astral bodies, I have not yet figured out. Like mine, they consisted of the finest threads, forming a faintly glowing fog, repeating the contours of the physical shells. I was so carried away by contemplating their souls, realizing that each of them is individual, that I missed new characters. A couple came out of the alley to meet this company. A young man and a girl. In principle, ordinary people. Yes...

Only there was something sitting on the girl's astral body in the neck area. This something had no physical component, only an astral one. And yet... It was alive! I looked closely. Most of all, the "sitter on the neck" reminded me of a chameleon in form, unlike people, the threads that made up its spirit were of one color - red. Noticing someone else's attention, the chameleon spirit turned its ugly head, with a mouth that took up its entire muzzle, in my direction.

Suddenly, the red spirit tensed up, tensing its illusory paws like a cat preparing to pounce, and licked its lips carnivorously, not taking its eyes off my window. The realization that they wanted to devour me went right to my astral liver! Right here and now, they would go and devour me! It was a very unpleasant sensation, frightening! The red spirit was very interested in my soul, walking around without a body, clearly interested from a carnivorous point of view. I felt its hunger as a barely noticeable, wave-like pressure.

I was scared. Very scared, that look reminded me too clearly of the feeling of slime that had sucked life out of me not long ago. Panic rolled over me like an unexpected tsunami. I barely managed to stay on the brink of losing my mind and not turn into a disembodied spirit madly rushing around the apartment, so I was overcome by the feeling of imminent death.

No, the demon himself didn't look scary. Small, yes, toothy, but in the movies I've seen monsters many times more terrifying. Only in the movies are you not doused from head to toe with the feeling of thirst and hunger emanating from a predator. And that was truly frightening. Even creepy. Unnatural. And for some reason, I had a firm belief that I was completely defenseless against this chameleon. A feeling akin to intuition confidently whispered about it. And also about the fact that my spirit was a desirable prey, while it was walking around like this, outside of its body. Obeying a hunch, I rushed to the bed and touched the physical shell lying on the bed with my ghostly palm.

As soon as I felt my body, I immediately felt calmer. However, I was still afraid to get up from the couch and go to the window. This meeting left an indelible impression on me. So strong that I couldn’t fall asleep that night. Despite the fact that the body shell gave me some sense of security, all the same, this feeling was not enough for me to be able to completely calm down.

It was a long, sleepless night.

I was never a brave man, and I probably couldn't be called a coward either, but this demon... He was frightening. The feeling of complete powerlessness against this creature of the other world was especially unpleasant. It seemed to me that he could devour my soul, condemning me to something much worse than simple death.

When the first rays of the sun broke through the window glass, I forgot myself in a restless sleep. But not even a couple of hours had passed when I was literally thrown up in bed by a pounding sound in my ears:

"D-z-z-z-z-!!!"

Was it really nine in the morning already? I quickly washed up, put on my robe, and opened the door. Yes, the doctor had come. This time I gave him slippers, hinting that he shouldn't come in wearing shoes.

"Well..." the doctor said thoughtfully, sitting down next to me and looking into my eyes. "I was thinking of discharging you today." Well, I understand him. When I looked at my reflection in the bathroom, I saw a pale shadow with red, sleep-deprived eyes. And my eyebrow is twitching in a nervous tic, and I can't do anything about it, at least my hands aren't shaking from what I've been through; that's an achievement. After measuring my pulse, he continued. "Young man, aren't you following the regimen I prescribed?"

"I do. I just had a nightmare."

"And what kind of nightmare brought such a strong young man like you to such a state?"

"I..." What to think of, I categorically did not want to tell the truth. "I... I was drowning and no one saved me."

"Ah..." He must have my full medical record, and it must include the case of Dan Lier falling into the sea from a passenger liner. So he must buy my simple lie. "Drowning, then... A nightmare, then. And show me, young man, the medications you're taking."

Well, there you go. I think I'm in trouble. Lie? No, that won't work. And come what may, as if I were the only young man in his practice who ignored his instructions. He opened the nightstand and took out a vitamin kit.

“Is that all?” the doctor said, barely glancing at one bottle instead of the three he had prescribed.

"I eat well." I don't want to make excuses, but I have to play a role, and a normal boy in such a situation would certainly try to justify himself. "And I wanted to cope with my nerves on my own."

"Eh-h-h." Raising his eyes to the ceiling, the doctor sighed heavily. "Youth-h-h-h. You don't have to take it to improve your appetite, since you eat normally, but you need to treat your nerves."

"Good!" I try to show remorse with all my appearances. "Excuse me for my high-handedness."

"You've already punished yourself." Is he hinting at the nightmare I had, in his opinion, because I ignored my medicine? Naive doctor. "I can't discharge you in this condition." He said thoughtfully, opening his notebook. "Today is Wednesday. So-o-o-o. I'll come by on Saturday. You need to get better soon. The school year has already started a month and a half ago, the more you miss, the harder it will be to catch up with the others."

"I understand," I say quietly, looking down at the floor.

"That's good, then until Saturday. Don't get up, I'll close it myself."

An hour after he left, I finally made it to the pharmacy and bought a sedative.

I was so unlucky to come to life in a world where people are doused with astal slime, and demons ride beautiful girls! But if you look from the outside, there are ordinary people around, calm, even kind, although so far I have only met two locals, and maybe everything is not so blissful.

Returning to my place, I took some medicine and almost immediately fell into a restless sleep.

I woke up well past midday. I took a shower and did the exercises I had forgotten about in the morning. After that, I sat at the computer and turned it on, staring at the desktop wallpaper. The impressions from the previous night were no longer so vivid, and my head cleared up.

So, what was THAT? In order. I managed to release my astral body. This is kind of good, because that's exactly what I was trying to achieve. But what was that thing sitting on the girl's neck? What are the possible options?

What if the girl were a mage and the chameleon was her astral familiar? Not a bad theory, but if it is true, then why didn't she notice the spirit in the window? Why did only the chameleon react? Another option: she is not yet a mage, but belongs to a magical family, and her potential has not yet been revealed. And the red rider is her guard, who perceived the disembodied spirit as a threat. Ugh, I have never seen living mages, and all my thoughts are a compilation of fairy tales and fantasy I have read. What other options could there be? The most obvious one is that the chameleon is a demon or spirit that possesses her. Not a bad theory. Or maybe the chameleon is some kind of alien parasite that subjugates the will of the host, and it wanted to attack me when it realized that it had been discovered?

After thinking about it, I dismissed the alien version. Because the Red One saw me and knew that I saw him, which means he would have easily found me, and my return to the body would not have stopped him. So, a demon or a familiar? A demon seems clearer, obsession is something I can easily accept. But a familiar and magicians... This version fits perfectly with my thoughts about a world government or a world lodge that controls progress. The presence of magicians hiding their abilities from people and slowing down technical development, this version had logic, which was confirmed by my indirect observations.

I really hope that the familiar is unreasonable. Because if it is capable of transmitting information about a soul freely wandering without a body, then... Yes, there are three options. First, they will kill me as a person with unusual abilities, but not included in their structures. Second, they will experiment on me if my ability is unusual for this world. And third, they will find me and begin to teach me. I really want to believe in the third option, but all my life experience screams that the first two are more likely to come true than teaching. There was also a fourth option, that such freely wandering souls are commonplace in this world, but I dismissed it almost immediately.

Unpleasant conclusions suggest from these thoughts. Can I escape from the city? To hide somewhere in the wilderness, where there are no people? However, the hope of escaping from the structure of the control of the whole world, if it knows about your existence, such hope is ridiculous! Such things work only in cinema and books; in reality, if such forces are interested in you, then they will find you.

And yet, remembering the red spirit, I did not feel the mind in it, only hunger and thirst. Yes, and he did not seem like a mind-endowed creature. Perhaps he is something like an evil dog? I remember that girl on whose neck it was sitting, she didn’t even look in my direction. Or maybe the spirit is not a familiar, but a murderer’s spell, which some magician put on a girl? Too little information, too much! And how can I survive in this mess?

Well, firstly, stop astral travels. Once lucky, the second time it can end much more deplorable. Secondly, I must learn to see the astral part of the world without leaving the physical body. And if the first is just safety precautions, then without the second, I can’t even superficially understand what is happening in this world. And not imagining this, I can do something stupid and die at any moment.

No, of course, it's a good idea to learn to see the Astral. The question is only who will teach me this? Searching for local teachers somehow did not seduce me at all! They will put such a spirit on the neck and ... either a leash, or a quick death.

However, if training with the mentor is not an option due to fear for my skin, then I will try it myself. There is only one nuance. I don’t know at all which side to approach this issue. Looking at the watch, I quickly dressed and ran to the newspaper stall, buying a local newspaper with private ads, an analogue "from hand to hand".

I was interested in very specific ads. I was looking for a club or a teacher of meditation. But here's the problem: in Shikuno, meditation was not very popular, and in such a small town, there was no one teaching it professionally. Why am I so unlucky? Wherever I go, there is no exit but a concrete wall.

One advert caught my attention, something like a group for training in gymnastics similar to Tai Chi. I'll have to go and see it, tomorrow there's a demonstration and a free lesson. I don't think it can help, but they say a drowning man should grab at a straw, so I'll grab one too.

The closer to night, the more uncomfortable I feel, as soon as I close my eyes, I see this chameleon spirit. Yesterday's unexpected meeting left an indelible impression on me. For the first time, someone looked at me as food, and it was not one of those feelings that I want to experience again. He wanted to devour me! I can literally physically feel his hunger to this day, such was its intensity.

But what if it's not a familiar, but a demon? What if it ate that girl and came back for me? Maybe it's sitting on my neck right now and... That slime, it didn't kill right away either!

This simple possibility short-circuited me. Could THIS be sitting on me right now?! My teeth chattered so hard that the glass of tea on the bedside table clinked. The more I thought about this option, the more clearly I imagined this nasty thing sitting on my neck and sucking the life out of me.

Realizing that I couldn't cope with my nerves on my own, I took the sedative prescribed by the doctor. I waited another fifteen minutes, but the anxiety didn't go away; I even had an unpleasant feeling, as if someone was squeezing my neck. I took another sip. And then another. Then I took the bottle and threw it in the trash. I don't know the ingredients of this medicine, and perhaps a large dose would kill me faster than any demon in this world.

Perhaps the potion worked, or I managed to overcome my fear, but in the end, the thought that I was being eaten, possibly right here and now, made me spit on my initial decision not to leave my body in spirit. Relaxing as much as possible, I tried to catch "that very" feeling that precedes separation. And an hour later, I succeeded. Soaring above the bed, I turned sharply in the air, ready to run away at any moment if I saw something frightening.

Having looked around in the astral plane and not finding the demon either on me or nearby, I quickly returned to the body. Well, thank all the gods, no one is eating me. The relief from this discovery was incredible. Until it let go, I didn’t even think about how consumed I really was by this paranoia. My nerves are going to hell! The doctor was right, I need treatment, otherwise a nervous breakdown is guaranteed at this rate.

In the morning, after breakfast at Himano's, I decided to walk to the sports club in one of the halls of where classes in local "spiritual gymnastics" were planned today. Which "equally harmoniously develops both body and spirit." This hall was located on the other side of the city, but in the local backwater, "the other side" meant a distance that could easily be covered at a leisurely pace in an hour and a half.

The doctor prescribed that I walk anyway, and the weather cleared up, having driven away low and dark clouds. So I walked on city alleys in high spirits. Previously, in my native world, I loved such walks, though I walked more at night, along the Neva embankments, but the sensations were elusively similar, possibly due to the eternally cloudy sky. Only now, I probably will not decide here for a night walk soon. In the meantime, the sun shines, albeit behind the gray veil of distant clouds, why not take a walk?

Since it was the middle of the week, and the time was the most working time, I didn't meet many idle passers-by like me on my way. Mostly elderly people or mothers with small children. I look at them, and if I abstract myself from the surrounding architecture, I might get the illusion that I'm not in another world but simply somewhere abroad.

In general, they build strangely here. All the houses are squat, it seems that even the five-story buildings are trying to cling to the ground, like snail-shaped houses. Massive sloping roofs further enhance this feeling. The local architecture avoids sharp angles with a stubbornness that is incomprehensible to me; all the corners of the houses are at least a little rounded. There are no well-shaped houses or high-rise buildings that are so familiar to me. If you forget that I am in the city and I am surrounded by residential buildings, then the houses of Ristol can be harmoniously imagined as some kind of breakwaters, which, for some reason, were built on land, and not in the sea. This feeling is complemented by small, narrow window frames. And here the streets are very wide, considering that there are very few private vehicles in the city, such a width of the roadway causes me some bewilderment. But despite this unusualness, I like Ristol, there is something in this city that arouses my sympathy. If it weren't for the demons, I feel like I would have fallen in love with this town very easily.

At the address indicated in the ad, there was a large sports complex. Indoor courts for team sports, a skating rink, two swimming pools, and many halls for fitness, boxing, dancing, and other activities. I asked at the reception how to get to the right hall. I had to go outside again, find the third building, and go up to the second floor. They don't like to build large or simply long buildings here; that's why there is such a rush.

In a small hall, no bigger than a regular school classroom, there were only four curious people besides me. There was also the master, as he called himself, the one who had submitted this announcement. For the first fifteen minutes, he told us that he had studied this art on the equatorial islands. I could hardly suppress a yawn while listening to this lecture, because here the reference to "equatorial islands" is the same as in our language, saying "studied in Tibet" or "experienced enlightenment among the Mojave Indians."

Then he showed "unprecedented" possibilities that can be achieved if you start learning the "ancient gymnastics of the Cloud Cover". Well, what can I say about what I saw, his stretching is truly amazing, but what I saw on TV performed by yogis on Earth is more impressive. After an hour-long presentation, the only thing that interested me was the breathing technique performed by the "master". Everything else is of course, also good for health, but not at all what I need. But as soon as I found out the prices for individual training, I politely asked for time to think and left. This "teacher" asked for more than I was allocated for board and lodging, and this was for eight lessons a month, an hour each.

The thought flashed to "invent" something and make money on a patent, but reason prevailed over greed and buried this idea. I'd rather be poor but alive than rich but not for long.

We can say that he spent time in vain. But this is on the one hand, on the other hand, the very presence of breathing technique in this world that allows you to very quickly relax muscles is a discovery for me. A very important discovery, because my separation experiments had always failed until I got rid of muscle clamps. And why did I not engage in yoga or Wushu in a past life? Such a fool, now it would help me a lot.

Eh, youth! Instead of being upset, I went straight to the bookstore. If there are techniques, gymnastics, and the like, then there are probably printed tutorials! Education on them, of course, can not be compared with classes under the supervision of a living teacher, but as they say, from a dead sheep at least a scoop of wool.

Having decided not to exchange for the little things, I went to the Central City Trade Center, because there was the biggest selection. Since the working day had not yet ended, there were not many visitors. The seller immediately approached me and inquired about the interest of a young man. At random, I blurted "breathing exercises" and was understood to my surprise.

A whole rack was dedicated to various gymnastics, three hundred books no less. True, after half an hour, my initial enthusiasm faded. Most books and albums were retelling the same info. The second half of the manuals was dedicated to the aspects of training athletes in various sports. Everything is not what I need. It’s good that at least no one drove me out and prevented me from leafing through the books. Having looked through the entire shelf, I really got rid of the whole thing, but why are my excellent ideas constantly breaking on indifferent reality?

"Oh! What a meeting." It came behind me.

"Good day, Mr. Coin." Although it was a surprise to meet the doctors in this store, I was still so tired from browsing the books that I reacted almost indifferently.

"Are you better?"

"Yes, thanks." Or maybe he is watching me? Hmm, most likely not, there is a coloring for girls in his hands, apparently he went to buy a daughter or granddaughter. At his age, a little more than forty, both options are possible.

"Interested in gymnastics?" That's ... it seems to him really curious.

"No, I'm looking for a tutorial on breathing practices."

"So, don't you like to drink potions?"

Um-m. What is he talking about? Ah! So good when a person comes up with an excuse. Exactly, the doctor decided that I did not want to take sedatives and look for breathing exercises in order to replace potions.

"I prefer it without them, if possible."

"It is commendable ..." And it sounded sincere, the first time I met a doctor who reacts so much to the patient’s reluctance to drink the prescribed medication. “Only you are looking for in the wrong section. Wait, one moment."

He left, and it’s true, not for long, returning a minute later with an unremarkable little book of about two hundred pages, in a cheap, soft cover.

"I recommend it just for you. If you work out with this book, then it will not pass and a month, as I can cancel the recipe."

"Thank you." I can't refuse. He could be offended. I'll have to buy this cat in a bag.

Having exchanged a couple of non-meaningful phrases, we went to the checkout. Here! Now I will have to buy for sure. Somehow, it happened that I was the first in line. Not to way out. And I did not want to insult the attending physician, rejecting his recommendation, rather than part with a certain amount of money. True, my eyes almost popped out when they voiced the price of this "cheap" book. I could have dinner in a cafe for a week with this money!

While in thought, I calculated his finances, the doctor said goodbye and disappeared into the toy store. What if really followed? That's what is bad in paranoia, so that you never know where it ends and reality begins.

I walked along the sidewalk, wondering, watching me or not. I am under supervision, or is it a coincidence, and Dr. Coin is just a good doctor and nothing more? Already approaching the house, I concluded that if I am under supervision and do not notice it, I still can’t change anything, and therefore I just need to continue to live while they let it do.

Entering the house, I quickly took off my clothes and jumped onto the couch, opening a book.

Two hours later, I set the text aside, just so much took a cursory reading and thought. I read something similar on Earth, the authorship of Vladimir Levy, only forgot everything. The doctor, without knowing it (or still knowing?), handed me into what was suitable, even better than yoga or Wushu - a self-instigator in auto-training. The book was written in a very simple and, most importantly, understandable language. And also divided into lesson chapters. In my situation, the real treasure!

Before you go to bed, I conducted the exercises of the first lesson, "Inner pendulum," several times. It had to streamline my breathing, lead it to a single rhythm, and, according to the beat of breath, relax the muscles. Of course, on the first day, I couldn't perform even such a simple task from the book. But the separation has passed many times more easily. Having left the body for a second, I examined myself on the subject of “a demon sits on me” and immediately “dived” again into the physical deposit, immediately falling asleep as the righteous.

All the time until Friday, I spent at home training. I will not say everything was given to me easily, but progress was noticeable. But so far, I could not figure out how to look at the astral side of the world without leaving the body. Here, it seems that what can be easier? Learn how to relax and breathe measuredly. In words, it is simple, but in reality, the task was not easy. It only seems that breathing evenly is easy. And why did I not do anything like that before? Oh, how would it come in handy now? I wonder how much time I will need to master all the lessons of the book, a year, two or more?

On Friday, as promised, Coin came, conducted a full inspection, and closed the sick leave. On the one hand, this is good, so physically I am really healthy, and on the other, now I will have to go to a local school. And you won’t get away, because the expulsion from school is equal to a visit of Social Services. No, I have not seen anything bad in the school itself. I still have the best memories of those school years, and re-live this carefree time, I did not mind. Only one detail was embarrassed, I did not feel ready for such a dense social integration into local society, I would have to be a alone at least six months, to figure out everything ... But I still do not have this time to adapt, so that there is nothing to dream of an unrealizable.

I checked all the papers, documents, certificates, and everything was in perfect order, only two signatures remained: the auditor of the local equivalent of the RONO and the director of the high school in the city of Ristol, where I was supposed to study.

The school system in Shikuno was a bit unusual for me. Children started studying here at the age of eight and went to primary school until they were twelve. From twelve to sixteen to secondary school. Moreover, primary and secondary schools were free and even compulsory. The senior school was also a four-year school, but it was fee-based, and you could only get in after exams. Dan passed these entrance exams while still at the school at the embassy in Austroia, and the money for education was allocated from his parents' account, in a separate column, as it followed from their will.

For me, the positive thing was that there was only one high school in the city. That is, students from different cities and rural secondary schools entered it. This means that there will be many students who do not know each other very well, which is an undoubted plus for me. The only bad thing is that I "fell ill" because of the mucus and missed almost a month and a half from the beginning of the new school year. That is, I will have to join a class in which people have already managed to get to know each other. That is, at first, I will be provided with increased attention from classmates and teachers. The attention that I do not need.

A couple of hours after the doctor left, after a hearty snack, I took a large suitcase out of the closet that I had never opened before. It had been in my luggage since Austroia. It contained the school uniform that Dan's parents had bought. It wasn't that wearing a uniform was mandatory, but it was accepted and considered good manners. In order not to stand out from the crowd of students, it would be better to wear it rather than go to school in jeans, a sweater, and sneakers.

The suitcase had two identical sets of dark blue uniforms of strict shape, also two pairs of boots, a pencil case with a large set of pencils and multi-colored pens, and papers about the end of younger and secondary schools. More precisely, copies of the papers, the originals, were handed over to the Headmaster the next day upon arrival in Ristol.

I leafed through them. Well, the conclusion can be made simple. Dan was not a genius, but far from an idiot. His average grade at the end of high school was eight point seventeen hundredths. Since this world does not have a five-point system, as I am used to, but a ten-point grading system, it turns out that he was a solid "good student". Of course, I knew all this from his memory, but I preferred to double-check. Someone else's memory is still someone else's, and a calculator does not make mistakes if your fingers hit the keys correctly.

I changed into my uniform and stood in front of the mirrored closet door. And I looked pretty good. More precisely, if you put aside false modesty, then I looked simply magnificent! The jacket looked like a naval tunic, though without any embellishments, the high stand-up collar made you hold your head up high, and the buttons were fastened slightly diagonally. The trousers were ordinary, but made of very high-quality material and fit perfectly. And if you add to all this the perfect swimmer's figure that Dan was endowed with... Poor female classmates! It's not that I was deprived of the attention of the fairer sex in my past life, but I was far from handsome, so looking at my new self, I even began to daydream in some anticipation. For about two minutes, I was in the clouds, or rather in fantasies of a very specific direction. After which, I glanced at my figure in the mirror again and grinned. The uniform was clearly designed by a man. How did I figure that out? Yes, for one fact, the jacket reliably hid the erection.

Well, here it is! As soon as I started thinking about girls, these thoughts swallowed me up completely. I should be thinking about something completely different, preparing for social adaptation, but I see women's legs flashing before my eyes, and not only legs...

I tried to calm down with the help of auto-training, but no way, the hormones were stronger. Not only am I sixteen now, but I also know very well what sex is, and all this was really filling my head and pressing on my underwear. I suffered, suffered, and eventually went to the shower, and washed myself at the same time. As a result of this healthy procedure, my brain cleared up, and I regained the ability to reason sensibly.

But this is a big problem! The Shikuno society is very conservative. Sex before marriage is not exactly forbidden, but still silently condemned. And according to Dan's recollections, lovemaking in a school environment is something out of the ordinary. Should I put up with this for four years? I'll have to find out later, by roundabout means, if there are girls in the city who provide a certain kind of service, otherwise, I'm afraid I'll break down. The fact that with each passing day, after getting rid of the mucus, I felt better and better, as it turned out, had a downside. Well, I somehow managed in that life, I can manage in this one too.

To finally ventilate my head, I went out for a walk. I visited Himano, drank tea, and chatted a little with her, carefully asking about the school. I did not find out anything new. The school, as a school. It's calm, not very prestigious, ordinary in one word. There was only one nuance, as it turned out, many students from rural schools and small towns rented rooms on Seventh Street. However, it was logical, from my house to school, only a seven-minute walk. So it is clear why parents rent housing for their children. The fact that I did not see a crowd of schoolchildren was explained by the fact that I go out for my walks during school hours. And I thought that these neighbors calmly took a sixteen -year -old living without parents? And here it turns out to be a very common thing. It’s better for me, the less I stand out from the total mass, the better.

Returning home, I ironed the uniform, both sets. Not only do I hate this work, but it took me a lot of time until the evening. I need to find out how much the ironing service costs at the dry cleaners across the street. If they don’t charge much, I’ll save on something just so I don’t have to do it myself in the future.

Then I started training. If it were up to me, I wouldn't leave the house until I learned astral vision, but who would ask me?

Repeating the “Pendulum” several times, I set about the second lesson of “River Sand”. It was necessary to imagine a quiet, warm, and calm wave, which brings sand, rolls over you with every sigh. And this sand is becoming more and more. It covers your feet, then the ankle, then the legs ...

In about forty minutes, something began to turn out. Where the body was already covered with imaginary sand, a pleasant, relaxing weakness appeared. When this "sand" reached the knees, my right leg jerked sharply, as if someone had released the spring. From surprise, I sat on the bed and began to check my leg, and then remembered. The tutorial said it was a relaxation of the so-called "muscle lock". Many muscles in our bodies are constantly tense, sometimes to spasm, but we are used to it and do not feel them, although such "locks" are one of the key barriers to complete relaxation of the body. In fact, the whole book and all the lessons in it were aimed at getting rid of these "locks". It also interested me from the other side. I read the book on yoga once. Oh, I read so much instead of doing. In that text, it was written that these “locks” interfere with the free course of astral energies in the body. Perhaps if I learn to get rid of them, I can go a step closer to my goal - astral vision.

"River Sand" was given to me much more easily than a Pendulum. Apparently, because it was tied to the imagination, and the imagination has always been my strength. True, the incident came out when I first “bombarded” myself with sand for the first time, I did not notice how I fell asleep, even forgetting to check if anyone was sitting on me. Moreover, I slept until dawn.

Despite the fact that I am in the life of an owl, today I woke up 7:50. So rested and sleepy, I probably never felt before. These classes definitely benefit, wake up early, it was always a big problem for me.

Saturday was spent in classes. It is not so easy to learn to relax, it is difficult work, as paradoxical as it may sound. You either fall asleep or the spirit escapes into the astral plane if you overdo it. Everything was further complicated by the fact that I tried, at the moment of complete relaxation, to try a partial exit of the soul from the body. Once something similar even happened, or maybe it seemed that it happened. So far it has not occurred to me that in order to obtain astral vision, nothing else can be done than to try to partially release the spirit in the eye area. Just a fraction of a millimeter, so that the astral "fog" goes beyond the pupils, for some reason, it seems to me that this will be enough.

Never before have I trained in something as seriously as now. This is what real motivation does to a person. After mastering the "River Sand" lesson, "Pendulum" immediately became easier. In addition, it was a plus for me that Dan was actively involved in swimming; that is, to some extent, my body already had certain skills in breathing practices. I think if it were not for this nuance, I would have been stuck in the first lessons of the self-study guide for weeks, if not months. In addition, in the evening, I learned a cheat. You slip out of the body in spirit for a couple of minutes, and it begins to breathe measuredly. All that remains is to return and not to lose your breath. So all day long I was doing the same thing in different variations, and, surprisingly, it did not get boring. And only an hour after sunset, I allowed the "sand" to cover myself completely and fell asleep peacefully. In general, this "sand" is simply a great exercise, getting rid of insomnia with frayed nerves.

Sunday morning woke me up with the quiet drumbeat of rain on the window. I stretched without getting up from the ottoman and rolled onto the floor, doing a couple of dozen push-ups, getting the blood flowing. Like yesterday, no trace of the morning melancholy.

It would be good to make a training schedule and generally write down my thoughts, but I was afraid to trust my thoughts to paper, and especially to a computer. Paranoia, damn it, did not think to disappear, sometimes there were even exacerbations.

While I was having breakfast, an idea came to mind about how to achieve partial separation using a slightly different method than I had tried before. I lay down on the bed, and after ten minutes of "pendulum" my spirit hovered above my body. I turned around right in the air and tried to touch my physical container with "fog". But as soon as my ephemeral palm touched the body, I was immediately sucked into it. The merging happened so quickly that I didn't have time to react.

Okay, the first pancake is always lumpy, it's familiar and not upsetting. "Pendulum" - separation. And again, I'm hovering over the ottoman. This state used to scare me, but now I'm even starting to like it, to feel weightless and capable of, albeit slow, but still flight, it's incredible. Previously, I experienced a similar sensation only when I was flying in a dream. A new attempt at touching and the same result, an instant fusion of the physical and astral bodies.

Bad, it feels like the spirit is instinctively drawn to return to the body. Maybe I started from the wrong side? Wouldn't it be wiser to first study the capabilities of the astral body before starting anything else?

Eh-h! I wish I had a couple of years on a desert island to sort it all out! Maybe I should really get out of the city, ditch school, and become a hermit? Well, that's a stupid idea, to trade a cozy apartment and boarding house for the life of a homeless person, especially since no one will give me an island.

Somehow, I've wandered in the wrong direction with my thoughts. My situation with isekai is almost perfect. It's a sin to wish for more. If only the world were friendlier, but here, alas, I have no choice.

Having made myself some tea, I sat down at the table and, scribbling in a notebook, began to think whether my astral experiments were so dangerous. Perhaps if I didn't go to the window and didn't leave the room, no one would pay attention to my spirit? Moreover, I have some kind of irrational feeling of security while I'm at home. Could it be that the otherworldly can't enter a person's house without an invitation, like in the legends about vampires? Stop! Nonsense! The slime ate me quite normally right in bed, that is, I can't even dream about safety in my home.

And yet, in those moments I am in the astral plane, I do not feel any danger. However, until that red one so clearly wanted to devour me, I also did not feel anything dangerous. Brrr, the more I think, the more this world seems more and more alien to me.

I need to decide for myself how I will live. Let's say no one knows about me, or more precisely, that I have occupied someone else's body. I will try to be an optimist and take this situation as a basis. Because if you start thinking about the bad, it is easier to immediately, right here and now, hang yourself. Because such horrors are drawn by the imagination that it is really scary to live.

I will have to go to school anyway. Since I don't need any additional attention from government agencies, even at the lowest level.

But should I get closer to the locals? Make friends and good acquaintances? Or is it better to play the role of an unsociable young man? No, it's too early to think about it. I need to study at school first and then decide.

Much more important is another thing, whether I should develop my "abilities" or "forget" about them. I am sure that the majority of people in this world do not even suspect the existence of the supernatural literally under their noses. This conclusion suggested itself when analyzing the newspapers and Dan's memory. That is, if I manage to pretend to be an ordinary person, then perhaps I will be able to live a long and happy life.

No matter how much I turned this thought over in my head, for some reason, it seemed too naive and untenable to me. Perhaps that girl on the street also lives like everyone else and doesn’t know that someone is eating her. I didn’t want such a fate for myself. What’s left? It’s all the same. I started off right. I need to learn and develop so that in case of a threat, I can first “see” the danger, and then, after analyzing what I “saw,” be able to fight back or at least escape. However, if the world here is ruled by a magical world government, then I won’t be able to either run away or fight back. Again, I was drawn to pessimism.

If the choice is between the life of a snail shaking from every rustle and an attempt to grow a fighting hamster out of myself, then I will choose the second. I did not want to live a second life in grayness and ordinariness. One was enough. I will train to the fullest, but I will not leave the room, do not go to the window. But I will.

Having lain down on the couch and having repeated the first two lessons from the book, I carried out the separation. Only this time, I did not touch the body, but having flown away from the bed to the center of the room, I sat down on the floor. First, I examined my hands. Such ordinary hands, quite human, only instead of matter, they consist of thin, barely distinguishable, multi-colored threads. These threads were intertwined quite tightly, if one can say so about something as ephemeral as the spirit. With the rest of the body, everything is exactly the same. Even my height in the astral form is similar to Dan's height. That is, my spirit is like a cast of the physical body, or perhaps this physical body is a cast of the spirit, however, the priority of this issue does not bother me much.

I can control my astral body as easily as my physical body, I do it instinctively. To fly above the floor and levitate in the right direction, you don't have to make any effort, just desire, and you're already hovering above the floor. And to simply move or wiggle your arms, you don't even need desire; everything happens naturally.

Having looked at myself, I switched my attention to the world around me. It really did resemble a drawing, with one difference: no artist is capable of drawing everything around me so qualitatively and realistically. From the astral plane, everything physical looked somehow unreal, illusory. I decided to pick up a pencil, but my palm easily passed through it. Eh! What a pity.

I tried to "compact" the threads with a mental command, but nothing came of it. Maybe this is the rule, and the astral plane cannot interact with the physical? How bad it is without a teacher! But where can I find one without risking my life? However, it is certainly useful to dream, but dreams of the impossible are now only a distraction.

I tried to somehow influence the material for more than an hour, but absolutely unsuccessfully. I decided to postpone this issue until the moment when I can get at least some information and not poke like a blind kitten.

Having moved closer to the bed, I began to examine the body lying on the sofa. The living matter was slightly different in appearance from the inanimate, from the same chairs or table. This "slightly" was expressed in the fact that the living also had moving spiritual threads; there were just an order of magnitude fewer of them than in my spirit, but they were there. Hmm-m-m, and is it not the human energy system I am now observing, which is so often mentioned by yogis and psychics? Is it not along these threads that the mythical "subtle energies" flow, or as they say in India, prana?

Looking into my body, I noticed many "knots", those places where the threads were tangled. Moreover, there were clearly structural knots; they looked, let's say, "natural and appropriate", and there were also those that I defined as incorrect, unnecessary, parasitic knots. Where did I get such knowledge from? It seems that no one taught me, but I look and "feel" this way, and that way. Intuitive, knowledge laid down by nature itself? Who can figure it out, the main thing is that they exist, and I would really like more of such "intuitive insights".

I wonder if I can try to untangle the parasitic knots and straighten the threads that are going wrong in the body? I tried to concentrate and smooth out one of the knots with my gaze. It didn't work, there was no reaction to this attempt. What if I untangle it manually, so to speak? But as soon as my astral palm touched the body, a merger immediately occurred. Ugh!

Opening my eyes in the physical world, I immediately felt a sharp attack of hunger. Apparently, my astral travels take a decent amount of energy. I was so hungry that I called Himano and ordered a double portion of the most filling noodles and a bunch of pies. As a result, as soon as they brought my order, I gobbled it all up in ten minutes and wanted more! This time, Himano did not call, but rummaged through the advertising brochures I had dumped on the nightstand by the door and found pizza delivery there. I immediately ordered three large pizzas with seafood.

It seems to me that these trainings in the astral world will cost a pretty penny, I'll go broke because of the food costs! Although, if I don't have fun and don't spend money on all sorts of crap, maybe what I get at the boarding house will be enough. The pizza was delivered hot, and I ate one of them right away. It weighed at least six hundred grams. What an appetite. I hope I won't get a bloat from stuffing so much food into myself. I listened to my body, but apart from the feeling of satiety spreading throughout my body, I didn't notice anything else. Apart from the fact that I immediately felt sleepy. I set the alarm to wake me up in two hours and, having wandered to the ottoman, I literally passed out.

Surprisingly, I didn't need an alarm clock. I woke up about ten minutes before it rang. However, I didn't feel that morning surge of energy. I had to go to the shower and chase away the drowsiness, the old, familiar method, pouring streams of a contrast shower on myself. Since there was still a lot of time left before sunset, I continued my training.

This time, after the separation, sitting down on the floor in the same place as last time, I focused my attention on a more detailed review of the astral body. The threads that made it up were not static. They not only vibrated barely noticeably, but something was "flowing" through them. Perhaps this is the very same flow of prana? Most likely, it is. Curious! But all attempts to control these flows led to nothing. But there was no point in despairing about this; Moscow wasn't built in a day either.

Looking at the vibrations of the colored lines on my palm, I wondered why these threads are multi-colored. Right now, blue is clearly predominant, blue in all its manifestations. I tried to remember the auras of passers-by. It seemed that pink and green shades dominated in them, but I can’t vouch for sure. I should look out the window and look again, but I didn’t even want to approach the windowsill. The possible benefit is not worth the risk that is possible when looking out the window.

I remember various psychics on Earth saying that people have different aura colors and that you can tell a lot about a person by the color of their aura. Maybe they weren't as charlatans as I thought then? And what would the prevalence of blue threads in me tell an outside observer? Is it good or bad?

What's really bad is that they haven't thought of the Internet yet! And I couldn't find a single book dedicated to mysticism in the bookstore. But maybe I didn't search well enough.

And yet, how I want to compare my colors with the colors of other people! I really want to. I got up from the floor and took a step towards the window. To be honest, it was scary, but I took another step and then noticed that the color of the threads that make up my spirit had changed, and yellow shades began to predominate in it. This discovery made me freeze and return to the center of the room. Why did I turn yellow? Because I got closer to the window? Or... While I was thinking, I calmed down and noticed that blue was my main color again. Gr-r-r-r-h! What's wrong with me? All this confusion made me angry. True, I didn't stay angry for long, because I immediately noticed that the threads that had just been blue were becoming crimson. But I didn't move anywhere, I was sitting in place, so what changed? Hmm-m-m-m. And again, the color changes to the usual blue tones. Is it really that simple?

After an hour of experiments, I realized, yes, "it's all that simple." The color of the aura depended on emotions. Experimentally, I managed to make several colored "bindings." Yellow - fear, crimson - anger, thoughts - blue, green - calm. No, not all my threads changed shade, no more than a quarter, but this was enough for the visual effect of "recoloring" the astral body.

Lost in thought, I rose to my feet and began to pace the apartment, wisely not approaching the window opening. If I could see the auras of others while in my physical body, what a treasure trove of information about the people around me! I would be a brilliant salesman or a psychiatrist or... My head was spinning from the prospects that had opened up, and my color changed to pink. Ha... So the phrase "pink dreams" didn't just come out of nowhere!

Внимание! Этот перевод, возможно, ещё не готов.
Его статус: идёт перевод

Переведено на Нотабеноиде
http://notabenoid.org/book/84161/586123

Переводчики: Camrad_RIP